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The legislation, which the Senate passed with a 24-2 vote, would direct the state to seek a waiver from the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in order to exclude elective abortion providers from receiving TennCare funding.

Minutes after Sen. Reggie Tate joined many of his Senate colleagues last week and voted for a bill that would ban TennCare funds from going to health care providers that also perform elective abortions, the head of a local chapter of Planned Parenthood expressed outrage on social media.

The legislation, which the Senate passed with a 24-2 vote, would direct the state to seek a waiver from the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in order to exclude elective abortion providers from receiving TennCare funding.

Tate was the lone Democrat to vote in favor of the measure.

"He's got to go," Ashley Brian Coffield, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Greater Memphis Region, said last week on Facebook, referring to Tate, D-Memphis.

In a Monday interview, Coffield clarified that she was not endorsing Robinson but simply highlighting her candidacy.

Coffield said the legislation in question would have a "disproportionate impact" on Tate's constituents, who she said are women of color in Shelby County.

"It's shameful that he would cut women off from a qualified provider willing to serve those women," she said.

Coffield said the latest vote from Tate is part of a larger pattern.

"The last thing we need in Memphis are people like Reginald Tate who are deciding based on their own political or religious point of view — I don't know which — that we need one less provider serving TennCare patients," she said.

In an interview, Tate said Monday the legislation would "not take away any money from people that are getting those funds."

Instead, he said, the measure would shift the TennCare money that goes to Planned Parenthood to local health departments.

"All we're doing is taking it from one agency and putting it into to another agency," said Tate.

"I'm not in here to hurt some person. The money is still there. If you need the services you just have to go to somebody else's office that's not doing wrong with what we're giving them," he said.

Coffield estimated the legislation would negatively impact thousands of people in Shelby County who receive care via Planned Parenthood as a TennCare recipient.

She said the legislation is "one of the cruelest bills" the organization has seen before, even compared to anti-abortion bills.

"This is just counter-intuitive," said Coffield. "This is about cutting women off from birth control and cancer screenings and (sexually transmitted infections) testing and treatment."

The Senate's vote on the bill sent it to Gov. Bill Haslam's desk to await action.

Should the measure be enacted, it would not immediately prohibit TennCare recipients from being able to go to Planned Parenthood. The state would still need to get approval from the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services regarding the proposal.

Reach Joel Ebert at jebert@tennessean.com or 615-772-1681 and on Twitter @joelebert29.